I’m sure you’ve heard me say this a million times, but SERIOUSLY. Everything happens for a reason. When I performed at Crazy Horse to raise money for the Canadian Women’s Foundation, I made a personal pledge to always find a way to support a good cause when performing. When you have an opportunity to reach out to so many people, to me, it makes sense to use that opportunity to raise awareness and support a cause.

So I was shopping for my little brother’s 7th birthday gift (and I mean 7th as in age, not as in gift quantity… lol!) at the St Laurent Centre in Ottawa… it had the closest Toys R’ Us to where we were headed, otherwise we probably wouldn’t have stopped. Walking through the mall, I saw a sign for a contest called “Be A Babe”.

I passed by, took a double-take, took a step back… it was a contest to support breast cancer and the Ottawa Regional Cancer foundation! You submit a video and for each vote you get, the mall donates $5 to the charity! The top 10 get to compete for a slot to perform at the Babes4Breasts concert!

…oh and the grand prize winner gets a $500 gift card for the mall. … 😀

Whether or not I win, I hope to collect as much as I can for this amazing cause! I encourage all artists in the region to participate!! You have until September 30th to submit your audition!

Songwriting. It’s like a 6th sense you can’t control. The melody or lyrics will come to you out of nowhere. And they do not care what you’re doing at that moment. They’re coming, and if you don’t catch them quick, you might lose them.

Seriously, I could be knee deep in laundry, baggy sweater and pants on, hair thrown up into a messy bun and the lyrics to a love song pop into my mind.

Like C’MON brain. I’m busy. Jeez.

And you can try and keep going, simultaneously repeating the lyrics in your mind over and over again… but then the more you repeat it, the more it changes—or the more you think it changes—you start over-analyzing. Then you’re not sure if it’s the same as when it first popped into your mind. Then you get frustrated, focus on what you were doing and…

POOF. It’s gone. Bye bye #1 hit. (lolz).

So, to avoid this disaster, I frantically lunge for my songwriting book (which I keep on my person at all times now)… slippers falling off, tripping over laundry… (ps, I’m pretty on top of laundry. I can see how it may now sound like I have mountains of it that I slave over. I don’t. I’m just being dramatic :3)… I also have to make sure I use my songwriting pen. I’m really anal about my songwriting ‘gear’ I s’pose. The husband has gone to use the pen a couple of times and I’m like “NOOOOOO you can’t it’s sacred!”

Anyway, sometimes, you don’t accomplish much in a day because you’re busy songwriting and EVERY moment you go to do something else, more lyrics happen to appear… and you can’t lose them. So the husband will come home and ask what I did today, surrounded by PILES of dishes, laundry, dust-bunnies (I’m seriously kidding) and I say,

They say you’re your own worst critic. Sometimes I wonder if that’s worse than someone else criticizing you… I think it’s easier to ignore negativity when it’s coming from others than it is coming from within yourself.

I was anxious for the show to air. I knew my performance wasn’t where I wanted it to be, but it all happened so quickly that I couldn’t really remember how far off it was from my scale of “acceptability”. Well, it was off. Way off. And no matter how much the people around me cheered me on, I couldn’t get past it.

I received tons of emails and notifications about my appearance on the show… I was so happy and thankful to have so many people supporting me… but the side of me that was still kicking myself wasn’t allowing me to enjoy the experience to it’s fullest.

Not one person had a negative comment. No one except for me.

You know that Taylor Swift song called “Mean”? The one she wrote about that critic who was a complete jerk and belittled her for her performance at the Grammy’s? I was that guy last night—to myself. I can’t be that guy. I had the opportunity of a lifetime and there I was, getting upset about one measly performance. The exposure that I got from this experience is the biggest shot I’ll ever get at making this a bigger part of my life.

I am so thankful for everything this show has brought to my life. It helped me learn who I was as an artist and grow into a stronger vocalist and grow my confidence. I mean, I gotta give myself a break here. I hid away my passion for this for years, and the first time I sing my own material was on a CMT show. That’s pretty freaking awesome.

I think one day I’ll look back at this and laugh.

Because,

“Someday, I’ll be living in a big ol’ city, and all you’re ever gonna be is mean.

I love Miranda Lambert and her voice… she’s fantastic! Did a cover of one of her songs based on a friend’s suggestion 🙂 Decided to do ‘Over You’—reminded me of my grand-mother who passed a few years back. Miss you Memere xo

…your best friend will always be the one to help you get through it better than anyone else. Best friends have a magical way of making solutions seem so obvious. Kinda like one of those high school moments where you realize, “Oh, so you mean he won’t like me more if I look him up in the phone book and call him pretending I’m a telemarketer?”

Just saying—that never happened. *Ahem* moving on.

You also get to tell them about the great times like…

…passing your driver’s test (miracles happen)

…successfully cooking an entire meal for more than one person (without killing anyone :3)

…throwing a crumpled up piece of paper into the garbage on the first try (after 3 practice shots)